Combining two genres into one, The Guardian Legend pulls double duty by splicing both a top down space shooter and an overhead exploration action game. Playing the role of a gynoid simply known as The Guardian of Earth, you arrive on a planet-esque fortress called Naju and must activate ten keys and detonate it while fending off hostile alien forces. 

 To progress through the maps, you must find various keys that open corridors leading to the SHMUP portions of the stages where you are met by an area boss that has to be defeated. Like The Legend of Zelda, the map layout is grid-based and navigation is fairly straightforward. It can teeter on getting repetitive, as you primarily go around blasting waves of enemies, but you do get a rather varied supply of weapons to spam that up the ante in how you lay waste to foes. You also have the ability to earn beefier health upgrades that can prevent a lot of the cheaper deaths that can occur in later portions of the game when the grind really starts to get intense and a better focus on shields and defense carries greater priority. The real setback is don't expect the formula or pattern of the missions to alter, it really is going to the right areas and activating doors, so exploration isn't quite as robust as Metroid.

The shooter missions are what made me fall in love with The Guardian Legend. Because I loved Life Force, Tiger Heli, and Gradius, I felt at home during these moments. The stages vary from high speed gauntlets to adequately paced and longer themed skirmishes with enemies that move in exaggerated patterns. They have a respectable difficulty, but at least you access to your weaponry. And I really dig the transformation sequence every time you engage these portions, it's like watching Macross. 

Perhaps the biggest knock I have against this game is the password system. Just get a load of THIS

I mean, c'mon. Eight characters, fine. Maybe even stretching it with twelve. But imagine having to write down ALL OF THIS any time you wished to pick up where you left off, or made incremental progress and didn't want to backtrack. Requiring players to record this Slovakian Morse Code is borderline criminal and the programmers should have cartridges of The Adventures of Bayou Billy thrown at their heads until they agree to proper treatment. 

That hefty drawback aside, The Guardian Legend is a pretty cool game overall, rather overlooked and underrated amongst the vast NES library. Used copies are still relatively very cheap and it's worth adding to your collection.